Measurement invariance of the anxious protection subscale the short version of the multidimensional overprotective parenting scale (AP-s-MOPS) in Chinese and Belgian adolescents

The Anxious Protection dimension of the Short Version of the Multidimensional Overprotective Parenting Scale (AP-s-MOPS) has been widely used to assess adolescent-perceived over-parenting, yet its measurement invariance has not been tested explicitly so far. In this light, the present cross-cultural longitudinal study first examined the AP-s-MOPS’s original factor structure and then tested its invariance across countries (i.e., China and Belgium), across types of relationship (i.e., father-child and mother-child relationships) and across meso-timescales. We further investigated mean-level difference in over-parenting when scalar invariance was established. Using data from a three-wave longitudinal study (with three-month intervals) involving 809 adolescents: 73.7% Chinese (N = 596, Mage = 15.05, SD = 1.27, 48.2% boys) and 26.3% Belgian adolescents (N = 213, Mage = 14.22, SD = 1.57, 55.0% boys), the results of confirmatory factor analyses provided support for the one-factor structure of the AP-s-MOPS in Chinese and Belgian sample. We found that partial scalar invariance for the mother-child and father-child relationship across China and Belgium at the first time point, full scalar invariance at subsequent time points, and full scalar invariance across father-child and mother-child relationships at each time point. Furthermore, the AP-s-MOPS exhibited partial scalar invariance over time for the mother-child relationship in China, full metric invariance over time for the father-child relationship in China, and full scalar invariance over time for all two types of relationship in Belgium. Finally, mean-level difference test suggested that adolescents reported higher levels of maternal over-parenting compared to paternal over-parenting, while there was no evidence for significant mean-level differences between China and Belgium or across time. The present research supported the AP-s-MOPS as a reliable instrument for cross-cultural and meso-longitudinal research on over-parenting.